ReconAfrica Spuds the Naingopo-1, Targets the ‘Damara Fold’ in Namibian Wildcat

Canadian minnow, ReconAfrica has finally spud the long awaited Naingopo (Prospect L), its second seismically defined well in the onshore Kavango Basin, in Namibia’s northeast.

It is also the first of the company’s four wells so far, that will primarily target the Damara Fold Belt. The earlier three wells had focused on drilling the so-called Karoo rift.

Whereas initial exploration focused on the shallow, “Karoo rift”, ReconAfrica is now focusing attention on the deeper Damara Fold Belt, which refers to series of large, anticlinal structures, resulting from a large fold and thrust episode, providing significant independent targets for exploration of an equivalent size to those discovered offshore.

“The Naingopo well is expected to test multiple reservoir intervals, of which four are included in our third party resource report from NSAI,” declares Chris Sembritzky, ReconAfrica’s Senior Vice President of Exploration. “It is targeting 163Million barrels of unrisked prospective oil resources or 843Billion cubic feet of unrisked prospective natural gas resources, net to ReconAfrica, based on the most recent prospective resources report prepared by Netherland, Sewell & Associates, Inc. (NSAI) dated March 12, 2024”.

With this probe, the company commences a multi-well exploration drilling campaign on Petroleum Exploration Licence (PEL) 73. The well is anticipated to reach a total depth of 3,800 metres (12,500 feet), and take 90 days to drill. Following it, ReconAfrica is planning to drill Prospect P, a second Damara Fold Belt well, targeting 278Mllion barrels of unrisked prospective oil resources, or 1.5Trillion cubic feet of unrisked prospective natural gas resources, based on the NSAI Report. Prospect P is expected to commence in the fourth quarter of 2024, subject to the results of Naingopo.

The July 7, 2024 spud date marks around 21 months since the furore that greeted the results of ReconAfrica’s first seismically defined well in the basin.

The Toronto listed explorer, in 2021, drilled two stratigraphic test wells in the Kavango Basin, at the time described by the Canadian geologist Tako Koning, as “an unregarded sedimentary basin”.  The 6-1 and 6-2 wells, the company reported, intersected over 300 metres and 200metres of oil and gas shows respectively. ReconAfrica did not call any of these a discovery. Indeed, it stated clearly that “the two wells were drilled to provide stratigraphic, sedimentological, reservoir and geochemical information”.  Although the data in both probes was very positive, neither 6-1 nor 6-2 was tested since they were designed to be only stratigraphic wells.

Makandina 8-2, drilled in late 2022, was ReconAfrica’s third well in the basin. It was the company’s first seismically defined probe in the campaign. It failed to encounter economic accumulations of hydrocarbons. The company placed the blame on the absence of a trap or a four-way dip closure. A lot of condemnation ensued, with some media reports cynically questioning the company’s claim that it had proven a working hydrocarbon system in the basin.

Brian Reinsborough, President and CEO commented: “. We are extremely excited to be drilling this high impact Damara Fold Belt well that our technical and operations teams have been planning over the past 11 months, since I joined ReconAfrica.

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